Re: First Outboard as a Child
Here's a short article I wrote a few years ago, published in the 1000 Islands Chapter AOMCI Newsletter...<br /><br />"True Blue Evinrude<br /><br />Most of us, in all the motors weve owned, used, loved, hated, broken and fixed, have one motor that holds a really special<br />place in our memory. Although I am primarily a Merc Nut, I do have room in my collection for aluminum of other colors.<br />Notably, the first motor I ever helped my Dad rebuild (as more than a casual observer) was a 1955 Evinrude 7.5 Fleetwin.<br />I was 12 years old at the time and we turned that basket of parts into a great running little motor. I had been driving our<br />little 12 footer with a 1961 3hp Johnson twin for a couple of seasons and we figured it was time to move up the power<br />ladder a bit. I ran that motor pretty near every day that following summer, putting countless hours on it. My younger<br />brothers all cut their outboard teeth on it, too, and as the years went by and the parental limit for power was removed, I still kept returning to that little blue Rude. It started easily, ran quietly, and was enough to plane off with a passenger and pooch.<br />Ive been known to buzz the neighbors docks with a Merc KE7 for an afternoon, but the Evinrude always resumed its position on the transom at the end of the day. <br /><br />Anyway, the summers went on by, I grew up, went to college, brothers went off to armed forces, college, etc. and we moved<br />on to bigger boats, more horsepower, water skis, and families. The ol Fleetwin had left its last cloud of blue smoke (gotta<br />run them 7.5s rich!) one summer in the early 1990s when one brother was visiting a girl on an island 4 miles from home. He<br />had just left her place for the trip home when BANG! The top rod let go through the crankcase. Not uncommon for these old 7.5s, but heartbreaking none-theless. The motor managed to limp home on the bottom cylinder, daylight showing through the upper crankcase. Even in its death throes, it wouldnt let us down! It was pulled off of the boat one last time and racked in the garage. Over the years the lower unit was scavenged for some project or another, the recoil was given to a neighbor with a similar motor and the carcass was left to collect dust. <br /><br />Flash forward 10 years, and you have the Internet in full bloom, motor parts available at the click of a mouse! I spied a<br />1955 7.5 Evinrude on eBay - described as a parts motor. The hood, and most of the extraneous powerhead parts were<br />missing, but the block and lower unit both looked good. I took a chance and bought it for $20! It took me almost that much<br />to have it shipped! It arrives a week later, and I tear into it. Not only is the block good, but so are the pistons, rods and<br />crankshaft! The stuck condition was due to slight rusting of the cylinder walls. A quick honing righted that wrong. <br /><br />To make a very long story short, this summer I got that old 7.5 back together again. I found the original hood buried in a<br />pile of parts in our storage barn, the original mid-section still racked where we had left it all those years ago, and a can full<br />of nuts and bolts. A little hunting around, net surfing and phone calls resulted in the last pieces of the puzzle. Who says you cant go home again? My 7-year old son can pull start the motor himself and is learning the ropes of operating the throttle, shifting and docking. The motor still has the same sound as 20 years ago, and the smell - well theres nothing like the smell of a two-stroke in the morning...." <br /><br />Well, that 7-year old son of mine is now 10 and he's got his Boater's Safety Certificate. He's now bugging me as to when he can run the 7.5 by himself, but for now he's buzzing around the bay with a '54 5.5 Johnson (as per his Mother's request because she feels the 7.5 is too fast just yet).<br /><br />- Scott<br />
<br /><br />Belchy
